UNIVERSITY WOMEN.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 151, 29 June 1939, Page 16

UNIVERSITY WOMEN.

TALK ON AMERICA.

ISOLATION POLICY EXPLAINED.

There was a large attendance at a meeting of the Auckland branch of the Federation of University Women held last night, when an address on American isolation was given by Dr. A. Botts. The speaker, who is on exchange from the Cortland State Xornial and Training School, Cortland, New York, has been lecturing in geography at the Auckland Teachers' Training College. The guests were received by Mrs. J. Morton and Miss E. R. Edwards, and Dr. A. Warnock, the president of the Auckland branch, presided at the meeting. Dr. Botts prefaced his address by stating that in world affairs, as in football. there was a tendency to become sideline experts. "We sometimes clieer. sometimes criticise, and are always readyto give advice, especially just now on the debated them 'If at lir«t you don't concede, fly, fly awav.'" lie said. There was a geographical basis for much of the psychological attitude of America to other nations in regard to the problems facing the world to-day, continued Dr. Botts. The fact that Americans and Canadians could live at peace with their 3000-mile lin e as an unfortified boundary between them limited their sympathy with European States who were constantly indulging in frontier disputes. Again, the huge percentage of foreign-born people Tn the population of the United States, although a great potential danger, had not proved an insuperable problem, as was apt to happen in Europe, while the racial problem, white versus negro, had also been solved to a very great extent. "Such factors as these rightly or wrongly gi\e the average, American a' feeling of superiority because he "et« | along with his neighlmurs ltettcr than the rest of the world." said Dr. Botts. '"But it must be admitted that there have been distinct advantages on his side. The development of the railways just at the time when the country was ready to expand toward the west united the interests, commerce and industry of the different States. Europe would have had a different history if her manv small countries could ha\e been linked by rail in the earlier stages of their development." Added to all this, said Dr. Botts, America had an abundance of food and a generous variety of natural resources. VYhat wonder if her attitude tended to become. "We can pot along very nicely why can t the rest of the world do the same?" The lecture was illustrated bv maps, graphs and charts shown by lantern by Mrs. Botts. 17